In recent years, commodity exchanges have become more and more dependent upon electronic trading systems. The older manual methods by which trades were conducted have given way to advanced computer systems that have generally mimicked the manual methods of old. These relatively new electronic trading systems have many advantages over the manual systems, including the ability to provide such features as greater accuracy, reduced labor cost, real time market information, more efficient communications over greater distances, and automated record keeping. However, because the markets in which these commodities are being traded are so vastly different from the descriptions of the instruments to transaction methodologies, electronic trading systems are generally limited to a specific market such as futures, cash, oil, stock, securities, etc., and sometimes even to a specific commodity within a single market.
An example of one such automated trading system designed for the anonymous trading of foreign currencies is described in U.S. Pat. Nos. 5,077,665 and 5,136,501, both issued to Silverman et al. and assigned to Reuters Limited of London. In the Silverman et al. system, a single central host computer maintains a central data base that may consist of the trading instruments available for trade, credit information, and various bids and offers that are present throughout the system. The host computer may then use this information to match active bids and offers based on matching criteria which may include the gross counterparty credit limit between counterparties to a potential matching transaction, price, and available quantity. To that end, each client site may establish, and may subsequently vary or reset, a credit limit for each possible counterparty. The credit limits may be used by the host computer to establish the gross counterparty credit limit for each possible pair of parties and which may be equal to the minimum of the remaining credit (i.e., initial credit limit less any applicable transactions that have already been executed) from a first party to a second party and from the second party to the first party. The host computer may block completion of an otherwise eligible matching transaction between a given pair of potential counterparties when the transaction has an associated value in excess of the applicable gross credit limit. In the Silverman et al. system, the various client site computers (also referred to as keystations) merely maintain and display a restricted subset of the information available at the host computer such as a predetermined number of the best bids and offers, and communicate credit and other transaction orientated information to the host computer for execution. However, in an attempt to preserve the anonymity of the parties, the client sites may not have access to the credit limits set by their possible counterparties, or even to the identification of any other party to a particular transaction until after a transaction has been completed.
Thus, in the Silverman et al. system, confidential counterparty credit limit data is apparently maintained and utilized as part of the trade matching process by the central host computer. As a consequence, each client site may not have the ability to determine, prior to committing to buy or sell at a displayed price from one or more anonymous counterparties, whether it is in fact eligible to respond to any of the bids or offers currently being displayed. Further, the credit limit appears to be merely a cap value (or credit line) on the amount of trading one party will enter into with another party. It has little to no relationship to the credit risk the other party represents since the financial commitment associated with the financial instruments traded with this system ends at the consummation of the underlying contract. Thus, a cap value may be sufficient in this particular circumstance. The central host computer may not utilize the credit information until after a match has been found between counterparties to determine if the counterparties have sufficient credit with one another to execute the trade.
Consequently, unless a trader attempts to execute a trade at the best price currently displayed on the trader's screen, the trader using one of the anonymous matching systems may not know whether the trader has credit with, and is willing to extend credit to, the anonymous counterparty offering (ie., bidding) the best price currently displayed on the trader's screen. Thus, the trader does not know whether any attempt to buy or sell at the displayed price may be subsequently invalidated by the system for lack of such credit. The Silverman et al. system also fails to provide for dialogue between the parties, much less anonymous dialogue which may facilitate the execution of a trade that might otherwise not occur.
Another automated trading system is disclosed in U.S. Pat. No. 5,375,055 issued to Togher et al. and assigned to Foreign Exchange Transaction Services, Inc. The Togher et al. system is an anonymous trading system which may identify the best bids and offers from those counterparties with which each client site is currently eligible to deal, while maintaining the anonymity of the potential counterparty and the confidentiality of any specific credit limitations imposed by the anonymous potential counterparty. This system is apparently designed to run as a closed system, with dedicated desk top terminals connected to various local computer centers which are in turn connected to regional computers.
In the Togher et al. system, each client site may only be able to view one foreign currency at a time per screen. The Togher et al. system is further limited by the fact that each client site may provide the system with only limited credit information for each potential counterparty (for example, a one bit flag indicating whether a predetermined limit has already been exceeded), and by the fact that each bid or offer for a particular type of financial instrument is apparently prescreened by the system for compatibility with that limited credit information before calculating an anonymous dealable price for presentation to the traders dealing with that particular financial instrument. The prescreening in Togher et al. is a simple check to determine whether any credit remains between the two counterparties to the potential transaction, and thus may be performed using a simple yes/no preauthorization.
The preauthorization matrixes may be maintained at each of the several regional nodes (also referred to as distributed nodes) of a distributed processing communication network, with each such regional node being connected by corresponding individual links of the communications network to the respective client sites (“access nodes”) for which it is responsible for distributing market information including customized dealable bid and offer prices and global best prices.
The sensitive credit limit data indicating how much credit a particular client site is willing to extend to each possible counterparty is preferably maintained at an access node associated with that particular client, and a simple yes/no indication of whether the entity (for example, a trader, a trading floor, or a bank) associated with that particular client site is willing to transact business with a particular counterparty is transmitted to the other nodes of the communications network.
To further limit the data received and processed by each of the relevant regional node computers, (i.e., the regional nodes closest to the particular site and/or closest to the particular counterparty), merely the changes in the credit state between a particular client site and a particular counterparty (i.e., that credit is no longer available or credit is now available) may be transmitted to the distribution nodes, and any credit state information relevant to transactions between two client sites both associated with other distribution nodes may be altogether ignored.
In the Togher et al. system, if either of the two applicable credit limits has not previously been exceeded between a particular pair of counterparties, then the system displays the entire bid or offer as a dealable transaction, but apparently permits each client site to block any above-limit portion of any resultant buy or sell transaction during a subsequent deal execution/verification process. This may, however, add additional time consuming steps for the users of the Togher et al. system. Alternatively, possibly at the option of the party by or for whom the low limit has been set, the entire transaction may be blocked. As a second alternative, a preauthorization matrix may indicate whether sufficient credit remains to execute a predetermined standard deal amount in addition to, or instead of, a mere indication as to whether any credit from a particular potential counterparty had already been used up. In such an alternate embodiment of the Togher et al. system, it might also be possible to display to each trader two dealable prices: one at which at least the predetermined standard amount is available, and a second one at which only a small amount may be available. Thus, individual orders are not independently treated, and the user may not have the ability to look through the bids and offers and deal at a worst price, if the user so chooses because of a difference in counterparties credit qualities.
In accordance with another aspect of the Togher et al. system, at least a first trader having an open quote that is displayable as the best dealable or regular dealable quote at any of the other trading floors is automatically alerted that their bid (offer) quotation is the best price available to at least one potential counterparty with whom mutual credit exists, and thus could be hit (taken) at any time. Similarly, at least if the quoter's bid (offer) quote is not currently the best with at least one trading floor but is thus subject to immediately being hit (taken) by a trader at that trading floor, then the quoter is preferably also alerted if his/her quote is joined (i.e., equal to in price, but later in time) to such a best dealable or regular dealable price from another trading floor. In other words, in the Togher et al. system, the auto-matching process does not enable the active trader to select a price other than the best price to trade. This may force the trader to accept what the system offers, even if the trader would prefer a different counterparty for credit reasons. In addition, the Togher et al. system does not show the trader the total depth of the market, only those prices which are dealable, and thus, may fail to give the trader complete picture of the market. The is also limited to the quantity stated. No provision is made for the modification or negotiation of the quantity or other terms of the trade.
The systems described above are such that they focus on overnight settlement risk. These systems are apparently incapable of dealing with the actual credit requirements of a variety of different individual financial instruments simultaneously and the counterparty's long-term ability to meet these requirements. As a result, these systems have generally only been deployed in the markets where settlement takes place in a few days and there are no continuous or ongoing credit requirements between the counterparties. Specifically, as a result of these limitations, these designs may not be able to handle the anonymous trading of financial instruments such as interest rate swaps, caps and many other financial products. They may be unable to accommodate these more complex financial instruments because, among other things, these systems apparently treat all financial instruments alike, and therefore, may be incapable of handling more complex financial instruments which require a judgment about the financial strength of the opposing counterparties. Trades conducted with some financial instruments such as derivatives create multi-year financial commitments, and therefore, mere credit limit or credit cap systems are insufficient means for measuring and managing an institution's credit risk.
Accordingly, it is noted that no known system is designed to operate with derivative products such as interest rate swaps, caps, floors, forward rate agreements (FRA), interest rate basis swaps, interest rate options, switches, or other over-the-counter derivative instruments. Derivatives are considered by many to be too complex to be efficiently handled within an electronic trading system. Particularly, derivative products are typically define by certain terms and conditions, and each of the different types of derivatives products are defined by a different set of terms and conditions. For example, an FRA is defined by a start time, an end time, an over date, and a floating rate option, while an interest rate swap is defined by a start time, an end time, an over date, a floating rate option, a frequency of the fixed coupons, a basis, and a special rule(s) as applicable with some currencies. Accordingly, the variances in the specific information necessary to adequately define the different derivative products has apparently been a deterrence to the development of an electronic derivatives trading system.
Yet another deterrence is the difficulty of determining a trader's position (i.e., interest risk position), and then identifying potential counterparties with offsetting positions for initiating a transaction. No known electronic trading system has been able to do this on a real-time basis. In particular, a large new market has recently emerged as a result of interest rate swap dealer's needing to better manage the risk associated with changes in interest rates on their Interest Rate Swap portfolios. As these markets have become more competitive, and the bid-offer spreads have narrowed considerably. This factored with the wide spreads of exchange traded Eurodollar futures has made the use of exchange traded contracts for hedging short-term risks expensive and sub-optimal. As a result, the switch was created. A switch is simply the simultaneous purchase and sale of a pair of similar Forward Rate Agreements. This instrument along with the mutually offsetting needs of derivative portfolio risk managers provides a perfect risk management tool for a large portfolio of Interest Rate Swaps.
Despite the obvious advantages and demand from risk managers, the complexity and time consuming nature of completing a transaction has resulted in this market growing rather slowly. Risk managers are generally very wary of disclosing the exact nature and size of their own portfolios. Therefore, finding a counterparty that has an opposite need is often difficult. It is a time consuming and costly task to collect the market information needed to determine a specific trader's own position within the market, much less to be able to identify potential counterparties with offsetting positions. This is currently done manually by voice brokers who prepare and send faxes listing days that a client needs to buy or sell, but the amount or importance of any date is not provided. This fax goes to other voice brokers and institutions and begins a process which involves multiple faxes sent back and forth until a deal is finally negotiated. This deficiency of the prior art systems strikes to the essence of the derivatives market which is based upon large financial institutions to being able to manage their credit risk on a daily basis.
Yet another deterrence is the need to account for the credit risk in derivative trading. In many of the current electronic trading systems, buy and sell requests can be automatically matched without taking the credit risk of the counterparties into account because the counterparties are free from future financial commitments once the deal is consummated. However, in derivative trading, counterparties may incur a multi-year financial commitment. Thus, any system that automatically matches offers and bids without consideration of credit risk would be untrustworthy and inadequate from the perspective of a trader.
Thus, a heretofore unresolved need exist in the industry for an electronic trading system that automatically discovers the credit risk position of a trader for use in matching the trader with other traders having offsetting credit risk positions.